More than ever before, residential consumers are being provided with a wealth of media resources. While cable television, the Internet, and on-demand media have been available for years, recently developed high-speed broadband technologies are enhancing the delivery of these media services. These technologies have made it possible to increase the variety of available media services and to enhance the ability of the user to interact with the media delivery system to tailor media delivery to the user's preferences. Satellite communications, asymmetric digital subscriber lines (ADSL), and broadband cable are providing new high-throughput connections to media delivery services. Media services consumers are commonly establishing wireless connections to satellites, telephony-based connections to ADSL, and broadband cable connections to the media service providers. Typically, these connections are processed by a Media Distribution Device that processes media content and data and routes the media and/or data to media presentation devices, such as a television or personal computer. A conventional Set-top Box (STB) is an example of a Media Distribution Device.
A Conditional Access System (CAS) may be used to restrict the delivery or viewing of media services. For example, a CAS may be used to prohibit a cable television (CATV) or satellite television viewer from viewing a certain pay-per-view event unless the viewer has paid to view the event. Traditionally, the CAS has required hardware smartcard technology. One such CAS has an access-enabling card (a smartcard) that is inserted into a Media Distribution Device and is able to decrypt data to view an event when the user has paid to view the event. The smartcard also includes account and billing information that is periodically uploaded via a phone line to the media service provider. For example, when a user purchases a pay-per-view event, a flash memory of the smartcard may be updated to reflect that the user purchased the event. The smartcard may provide decryption of the pay-per-view event and allow the user to view the purchased event. At a later time, such as during the early morning, the Media Distribution Device may connect via a phoneline to a billing system to update the billing system with the billing information from the smartcard. This type of CAS may be referred to as a hardware CAS because it includes a piece of hardware (smartcard) at the Media Distribution Device that is used to provide conditional access.
Although a hardware CAS works fairly well, it does have some problems. One problem is that a hardware CAS costs a great deal of money to implement, maintain and update. For example, a smartcard may cost around ten dollars. Periodically, updated smartcards need to be provided to all customers. A CATV or satellite service provider may have millions of customers. Thus, the costs of providing updated smartcards are great. Moreover, customer support must be provided to help users who have difficulty installing their new smartcards. Also, some customers may become frustrated and cancel their service, resulting in lost revenues. Moreover, the cost of smartcard readers, smartcard media and the administration process for managing smartcard distribution is high on a per device basis. Thus, a hardware CAS is expensive to implement and maintain.
Another problem with a hardware CAS is fraud. Smartcards may be cloned, hacked, stolen, duplicated, moved, etc. and these cards may be used to receive media services without paying the proper revenue to the media service providers. Even if a smartcard is not tampered with, the billing system is only periodically updated by a user's Media Distribution Device. Thus, a clever and devious user may view a pay-per-view event, but then disconnect the telephone line from their Media Distribution Device before the Media Distribution Device dials the service provider. Thus, a user may be able to delay or circumvent payment for media services due to deficiencies in the hardware CAS technology.